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The team is now promoting the park armed with a new economic impact summary, claiming that it will add value to the adjacent Seward Park Urban Renewal Area (SPURA). Specifically, Ramsey and Barasch argue that building the park would boost SPURA land values by $10 to $20 million and generate up to $10 million in taxes over the next 30 years. The Lowline also revealed its estimated budget, clocking in somewhere between $44 and $72 million to be paid for by a combination of fundraising, donations, and tax credits. If all goes according to plan, the Lowline could be financially self-sufficient, with a $2 to $4 million operating budget paid for by special events and commercial space. Uncertainty still looms over project, however, as the MTA hasn’t agreed that the space will be allowed to be converted into a park.

The project calls for up to 1.65 million square feet of mixed-use space built from the ground up on a site covering eight city blocks in the Lower East Side that Robert Moses leveled in the 20th century. The project also calls for a reconstructed Essex Street Market and a new 15,000 square foot park. The notice comes with a warning that the RFP process “will have an aggressive timeline,” between January and May 2013. Watch for the official RFP to be released at the NYCEDC website, and get ready to rev those rendering engines, architects!

SPURA Redevelopment Sails Through City Planning.
The planned 1.65 million square foot redevelopment of two blocks of the Lower East Side was approved by the Department of City Planning with no requests for changes, according to DNAinfo. The Seward Park Urban Renewal Area (SPURA) is a Moses-era slum clearance project that has stood vacant since the 1960s. The redevelopment would include 900 apartments, 500 of which would be designated as permanently affordable housing, as well as retail, community, and green spaces. The plan now needs approval from City Council to proceed.

The Seward Park Urban Renewal Area (SPURA) that occupies 14 square blocks on the Lower East Side has remained one of the largest underdeveloped city-owned parcels of land for more than 40 years. Very few of the originally-planned buildings came to pass, and vast parking lots created by slum-clearance on the south side of Delancey Street symbolize a hotly contested renewal plan. Gabrielle Bendiner-Viani and students of the New School’s City Studio have spent three years investigating the complex issues surrounding the site, and in an exhibition highlighting their research and artwork they propose to instigate a new grassroots conversation rather than a top-down planning vision.

Residents took to the floor before the CB3 Land Use Committee approved the SPURA guidelines.

Last night, the Seward Park Urban Renewal Area (SPURA) took a giant step forward after 44 years of contentious debate. Community Board 3’s Land Use, Zoning, Public and Private Housing Committee approved guidelines for development of the city-owned land at the foot of the Williamsburg Bridge.